Gulch Distillers’ Purple Prairie Barley Whiskey started with a conversation
and the question, “What if…?”

The 2018 Release of Gulch Distillers Purple Prairie Barley Whiskey

Like good bread and good beer, good spirits come from carefully managed natural processes. And the very best fermented food and drink comes from skilled hands using ingredients from known and respected sources.

Grain-based products – like whiskey – can be made with any cereal grain including wheat, barley, rye, and “wheat relatives,” like spelt and emmer. All of which are grown in Montana. However, Gulch Distillers uses only Montana-grown grains in their grain-based spirits.

I had to ask, “How about partnering with Timeless Seeds to make whiskey out of our Purple Prairie Barley®?”

Most of the US forgets – or is simply ignorant of the fact – that the Northern Great Plains are a major part of the nation’s “bread basket.” They’ve been raised to think that wheat comes from Kansas.

The truth is that northern-tier states east of the Rockies produce millions of bushels of wheat, most of which is sold by the train carload to one of just a handful of huge commercial flour mills or is exported. In fact, 85% of the wheat produced in Montana – and 50% of the wheat produced in the US – is exported to over 70 countries.

Our goal at GoodFood World is to stimulate discussion by reporting on the critical issues affecting the production and use of organic wheat and other grains, especially the challenges to small-scale organic family farms, millers, and bakers. Have you bought locally grown grain, flour, or bread? Your comments and input are appreciated!

It was a hot and hazy August day when we drove 15 miles due west of Augusta, Montana, into the rolling hills where we glimpsed the foothills of the East Front of the Rocky Mountains and the edge of the Bob Marshall Wilderness. As we passed the Nilan Reservoir, we edged further into drier ranch country.

Ordinarily on a late August morning, you wouldn’t find a couple of dozen people in seed caps and brimmed hats gathered on a sunny hillside in west central Montana just for a chat. We were there to learn!

The day’s event, Day on the Range, hosted by the Lewis and Clark Conservation District (LLCD) and the Natural Resources Conservation Service Montana (NRCS MT), addressed an array of topics to both educate and enlighten ranchers and farmers – and a few lay people like us.

Farmers markets and CSAs sprout up every spring along with the lettuce and tomato plants. Supermarkets across the country, from small family-owned stores to big box chains, are all offering organic options throughout the store, not just produce any more.

And we have more and more options to choose from in the “middle of the store.”

So, we all think – or would like to think – that we’re eating nutritious food. Do we even know what good “nutrition” is?

When you pull into Prairie Grass Ranch, just a seven miles south of Havre MT in the northern foothills of the Bear Paw Mountains, you’re greeted with rolling hills and open skies. Jody and Crystal Manuel are organic dryland farmers and beef ranchers on this 4,000-acre spread.

Just 10 years ago, the Manuels began their conversion to organic farming and today they raise lentils, KAMUT® Khorasan wheat, emmer, spelt, rye, hops, and cover crops including yellow clover. Livestock ranges from broiler chickens and laying hens to grassfed beef and pastured hogs.

On a beautiful early summer day, more than 100 people gathered for a Montana Organic Association Farm Day to learn more about dryland cropping, cover-crop grazing, soil health, and control of the organic farmer’s nemesis: bindweed.

The Bounty of the Gallatin Valley

(Source: Nate Brown, Amaltheia Dairy)

Amaltheia Organic Dairy is more than an organic goat dairy and cheese maker and it’s more than the home of delicious organic whey-fed pigs. Amaltheia is also home to Nate Brown’s beautiful organic produce.

In a valley sadly being encroached on by developers throwing up cheaply made and expensively priced homes for Bozeman’s growing population, Amaltheia proudly produces a full menu of protein and produce.

It is operations like Amaltheia, run by livestock raisers and cheese makers Mel and Sue Brown, and their son Nate Brown, produce farmer, who need to be honored, respected, and protected, for the hard work they do to deliver some of the best food in Montana.

Look at those root vegetables! Look at those peppers! You can do your part by shopping at your local farmers market. And while you’re there, hug a farmer and thank them for your food!

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Book of the Month

Stand Together or Starve Alone: Unity and Chaos in the U.S. Food Movement By Mark Winne

“The Food Movement” is a pretty big concept – it can incorporate anything and everything from farming and food production to distribution, marketing, and retail sales. Then toss in farmers markets, food co-ops, and CSAs (Community Supported Agriculture) and it’s a topic that is hard to get your mind around.

In Stand Together or Starve Alone, Mark Winne uses the term “food movement” as an over-arching concept, however he rounds it up into a more straightforward description: “Food Security.” Read on...

A Video You Don't Want to Miss!

As a member of the Blackfeet Nation, Mariah Gladstone, IndigiKitchen, shares the importance of an Indigenous-based diet.

Gladstone poses the question of whether a nation can truly be soverign if they are unable to provide for themselves. Something we should all ask ourselves as we move farther from being able to do so.

LEARN MORE ABOUT HOW YOUR FOOD GETS TO YOUR PLATE

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